Truth is: they’re looking for the wrong sensation. Calm and stillness never changed anything. All those people just watched the world pass and then faded away. Look outwards and not inwards, forget ‘give peace a chance’; I say ‘give anger a chance.’
Some called what I had to offer ‘an eye-opening experience.' I couldn’t have agreed more.
Go ahead. Open your eyes and tell me what you see?
Anger and rage all around.
Inhale the earth and what do you smell?
Blood and death all around.
Open your ears and what do you hear?
The sound of another bomb fall.
Reach down and touch the soil and tell me what you feel?
Nothing but concrete, a hollow existence.
Open your mouth and tell me the bitter taste it leaves as it overflows your senses. Let each one race through your system one by one. Feel it course through your veins.
Now tell me this: doesn’t it feel fucking fantastic?
CHAPTER 2
The streets that night were bare. The usually clogged concrete arteries had bled its workforce dry for another day. Here we sat—perched on the steps at its cold, dead heart, drinking the night away. Just two guys who were pissed: pissed at the world, life, and everything in between, and had nothing better to do on a Tuesday night than hurl abuse at passers-by. The steadily-darkening sky had reached its final ominous indigo, illuminating our faces in deepening shades of crimson. Among the daisy chains of slumbering hobos and other lowlifes, we sat on the steps of the shopping mall, basking in its cold, uncaring shadow.
Everything was cold to touch. Everything, except the bottle.
I took one big gulp, feeling it warm its way all the way down my gullet before passing it back to Jason.
“Look at this asshole over here.”
A man hurried past us wearing a suit which looked as if it had been woven from an old, ugly blind. He had the phone pressed up against his ear, babbling away with self-absorbed authority to someone on the other end of the phone call. And yet his eyes never left us until he was well out of sight.
“Yeah, keep on walking, asshole!” Jason hollered as the man mumbled something down the phone.
“He can't even look us in the eyes.”
“Because he's scared.”
“Yeah,” I said. “He is scared. Scared of the big, bad wolves.”
We howled like maniacs as the man hurried away. He stole a nervous glance back at us before rounding the first corner he could find. Whatever dark alleyway he had accidently stumbled down seeming like a better option than staying in our presence.
Jason took one last long swig from the bottle of Wild Turkey and then smashed the bottle against the opposite wall. A nearby hobo sounded like he was coughing up a lung. Another continued snoring.
We laughed mercilessly, drunk as the intoxication rose, hot and pulsating, to the top of my skull and spilled out in waves of words.
The red glow of the sky reflected down on the broken glass. The smell of rain and piss was soaked into the walls so badly that it was a permanent fragrance, a bitter, lingering smell that would burn away your nostrils if you swayed too close.
I tried to get back up to my feet, but my vision swayed. The buildings seemed to bow and nod like wise old Chinese men, as though admiring the fact I was still standing. Somehow, we managed to put one foot in front of the other and made our way downtown until we came across a run-down liquor store desperate enough to allow us inside.
“I need another bottle,” my whiskey-soaked voice demanded to the blurred silhouette behind the counter. “Cheap and cheerful.”
“Sorry, buddy, but I can't serve you anymore.”
“What the fuck does that mean? ‘Can't serve me anymore?’”
Jason staggered to my side with a liquid grace, eyes protruding and bloodshot as though trying to escape the lethal percentage of alcohol in his skull.
“Look—” I rummaged through my pockets and spilled what few coins and crumpled-up notes remained in my pockets onto the booze-stained counter top.
“I've got, what—twenty something dollars. All I want is one more bottle. Just the one and we’ll be out of your hair. Now, you going to give me it or what?”
Straining my blood-red eyes, I could just about make him out. The kid was a snotty-nosed youth, probably mid-twenties at the oldest, but the arrogance around was just like all the others in this city. He believed himself to be a walking incarnation of some kind of spindly-limbed, bulbous-headed god. This was his house; his temple, and we were just a couple of drunken wise men here to pay homage to his sweet, delicious gods. He flicked his bored eyes at me as though I was a piece of dirt on his high altar.
“It’s not going to happen, all right?” he said. “Now, are you going to leave quietly or will we have a problem?”
“Come here a second,” I insisted with a casual wave. “No, just come here a second, kid, don’t be so shy.” I continued beckoning him closer. He nervously obeyed like a good little puppet.
My fist connected with a hollow thump against the side of his jaw. He fell backwards, sending several bottles flying off the glass display behind him. Another larger, blurred silhouette, presumably the manager, came lunging at me from the corner of my vision with a baseball bat clutched in his grubby fingers. Jason smashed the bottle of whiskey over the top of the man's head before he could swing at me.
Both men lay slumped on the ground, groaning in a mix of spilled blood and alcohol.
“Petey boy! Did you see that shit? Fuck yeah!”
My head throbbed. I stopped and pinched the bridge of my nose. Jason hopped over the sticky counter top and grabbed as many bottles as his greedy hands could carry. He started shoving bottles into my open hands and jacket pockets. Before I was aware what had just happened, he was halfway out the door.
His voice was wild and feral as he yelled that we run before the police showed up.
We ran in a drunken stupor, the blur of the grime-stained city lights keeping me vaguely on the sidewalk. We ran and ran from invisible lights and voices until my chest felt like it was going to explode. I held my hands up in defeat, lungs burning as bad as my throat. I vomited most of my last meal up onto the sidewalk. Jason slapped me hard on the back.
“That's the kind of shit I was talking about!” He hollered and hooted as I wiped the dangling pieces of vomit from my chin. The taste of stale whiskey burned in the back of my throat. My eyes felt like they were ready to roll out of my head and drop into the pool of vomit at my feet.
“Man, that was a rush! You ever feel that alive?”
“I hit that guy,” I managed through the gauze of my watering eyes.
“Hell yeah you did, Petey boy! This calls for a celebration!” Jason popped the cork off a stolen bottle of whiskey and took a long, deep swig before passing it to me.
A voice yelled out for us to be quiet. Then I saw the rage in Jason’s face. It flowed as strong and clear as the blood flowing through his veins.
Intangible. Involuntary. Necessary.
A man strode into our hazy view, demanding to know what we were yelling about. As he walked into the streetlight, we saw he was of squat build with a large lumpy head and hands to match. His eyes were dark blue bruises in the hollows of his face. He had a crooked smile full of missing and rotting teeth. A shaggy unkempt beard covered his cheeks and neck, serving only to exaggerate the enormity of his head. He was incredibly ugly, even before we had met him.
If he tried to protest any further, it fell on drunken ears.
“You two mind explainin’ what the fuck you’re yelling ‘bout?”
The poor guy had no warning, as in an alcohol-infused rage, we descended upon him like wild animals.
I suppose that's how it all began really. Long before we had structure. Long before the idea of 'Playdates' had truly begun.
CHAPTER 3
I watched the city lights go by in a blurred palette of neon blues and greens all the way up to
the ghostly white of the streetlights as Jason and I drove up to our destination. An old Georgian house, just past the run-down market district on the outskirts of the town, had recently gone up for private showings. Jason had spotted this just a couple of days ago and as fortune dictated, it was his letting agency selling the house. He made sure that he would in charge of selling it to some unfortunate fool with more money than brains. Not like anyone with half a brain would think about moving into this city. That meant he held the key, and tonight, it would serve a much more useful function.
“Keep heading up past 3rd and make the next right,” Jason pointed as he too began to watch the lights and the city rush past us without a care in the world that we were ever there. People raced past without the courtesy to acknowledge our existence. The human traffic on the narrow sidewalks flowed around each street vendor, nightclub, and bar like a tightly-packed, sweaty flood. Colourful legions of aggressive youths, muggers, crack-heads, alcoholics, and ten-dollar whores prowled around in these waters like sharks, adding their mass to this constant flow. Music and voices from all around carried these people in its racing current to where it would finally open into a place where they could finally drown themselves in overpriced alcohol. Blot it all out for another day.
I reached over and raised the volume knob on the radio. It didn’t matter what station was playing, I needed something to numb it all out.
“I thought Sarah wouldn’t shut the fuck up tonight,” Jason said with an outward sigh.
“It’s important. Trust me,” I replied, trying to maintain my concentration.
“Yeah? And why’s that?”
“It just is. Keeps us grounded. Keeps us human.”
Jason let out a laugh.
“She’s a lot smarter than you give her credit for, by the way. She knows half your stories are bullshit. She just puts up with it to humour you.”
“Hah! And why’s that?”
“Would you be pissed if I said it’s because I told her?”
“Take this turn coming up here,” Jason motioned the direction with a wave of his hand. “Man, this song sucks!”
Jason reached over and began to fiddle with the radio dial, desperately scanning between stations, never leaving on one for more than a few seconds.
“Well, would you?”
“Would I what, Pete?” His features hardened into a steely-set gaze.
We stopped at a traffic light. I looked into his eyes for a sign. Any giveaway. Any indication. A twitch, diluted pupils . . . anything.
“Doesn’t matter.”
Dissatisfied, I rolled down the window and let the cool evening wind race across my face.
Those little moments are important. Those little connections that you feel each day are important—no matter how small.
It grounds you. Reconnects you. Makes you feel human.
On we drove through the city, past acres of peeling paint and grey slabs of old, forgotten buildings, past ordinary square houses and overgrown parks. Out near the bustling centre, sat shopping centres and the occasional skyscraper. They stood like glittering tombstones in the night’s illumination, marking the streets and buildings. There are ghosts everywhere in this city, too old and tired to protest anymore.
Jason guided us up a gentle slope as we drew closer. An old Georgian house sat perched on the top of a small hill. From a distance, it looked almost carved out from the midnight sky. All the other houses were miles away, just ordinary squares and rectangles, but this one—this one was special. I could feel it.
I smiled as I noticed the familiar shape of Tony’s midnight-black Porsche parked so precisely in the asphalt driveway leading up to this lonely, isolated house. It looked more like the work of a jeweller. Stars sparkled on its chromium steel, its black enamel the colour of the night—mine in comparison, a greying veteran of the automobile industry.
One by one, our party began to arrive.
* * *
Jason and I disembarked from my piece of shit ’87 rust-bucket and strolled over to meet up with the rest of the group. Tony outstretched his hand to shake mine and then Jason’s in his tight, businessman-style grip. His hand easily wrapped over mine and almost crushed it in his strong grasp.
“It is good to see you both,” he announced in a most sincere and official tone. “It has been far too long.” His voice was so full of charm and enthusiasm that it was almost impossible to resist his spell.
“Glad you could make it,” I answered and clasped my hand on the right shoulder of his tight-fitted black suede jacket.
Tony was another of our group that we would only rarely see back in those days and a little too much of in the later days. He was an aggressive businessman and cared little for others apart from himself unless they had something to offer him. He was a borderline sociopath on a good day and a lit stick of dynamite on a bad day. Try as he might to blend in and become a faceless member of society, it was not to be. It coursed through his veins like it coursed through all our veins.
He was one of us from the beginning until the end.
I twisted my head as another figure walked into the light. His spindly legs uncoiled forward one by one in small steps as if struggling to balance the dead weight it held. His scruffy, unwashed hair danced as a strong wind kicked up. The faint glow of a cigarette clenched in his fingers gave the final indication to whom it was.
“It is good to see you, Marcus,” I responded with a welcoming nod. He returned the greeting with a lopsided grin.
“Is this all for tonight?” I asked.
“Just have to wait for Alice and Jonathan to arrive with their ’Playdate’.” Tony brushed some imaginary dust off one of his sleeves.
“Well, come on in and let me show you the place,” Jason winked as we crossed the threshold into the darkness.
CHAPTER 4
About one mile away a different type of meeting had taken place in a sleazy club.
The interior of the nightclub thrummed to the resonating bass notes and explosive cacophony of dance music. Drinks poured like water from a waterfall as the youth of the city performed the ancient art of turning paper into water. Pay checks were drank. Women became wilder and looser as the drinks kept flowing and the music kept on pumping with wild abandon.
Out on the dance floor, hands, feet, and faces moved as one; bobbing, swooping, grinding, and pressing ever harder into one permanent shadow of swaying, sweaty hips and eager hands to the beat of the music. Neon glow lights flickered overhead, serving only to accent the darkness. Girls swayed to the rising beats, hair whipping around like animals in heat. Their glittering dresses accented their young, lithe bodies as the men eagerly danced ever closer to them—poor judgement and poor lighting their two crutches to stand upon.
“I'm telling you this is a stupid idea.”
“God, will you just give me a break for once?”
“I'm just saying. Why are we wasting our time here? What is it you’re trying to prove? You're just going to fuck up anyway.”
“Oh yeah? And why is that? What makes you so goddamn perfect?”
“Because, Alice, you're careless, unlike me, and are way over your head. Hell, let’s just be honest for once: you’re only doing this because you love the attention, right? You can’t smile unless you know that every man in the room wants to fuck you.”
“Jonathan, will you just shut the—”
Alice innocently tilted her head back towards the drunk man as he sank back down into the empty seat beside her. He had rolled up the sleeves of his loose hanging shirt, baring his hairy, ape-like arms and cast one over Alice’s exposed shoulder. She noticeably chewed her lower lip in frustration as she continued the conversation back into his sweat-stained armpit.
“You know, Alan—”
“It's Steve, actually,” the man slurred over the blaring music. Spittle splashed against her exposed shoulder.
Alan, Steve, like I care what your name is . . .
“It's getting a little too loud in here.” Alice
leaned seductively close and whispered into the man's ear. “Why don't we go somewhere a little more, private?”
“It’s like you read my mind, baby,” the man spat. The rolls of fat on his chin dripped with saliva and spilled beer. “Where did you have in mind?”
Alice wiped the saliva from her shoulder and took his sweaty hand as they both rose out of the booth together. She let his wandering eyes look twice over her beautiful figure. Jonathan disapprovingly watched, shaking his head as she pressed the small of her back outwards to accent her chest. Her white dress clung to every inch of her petite figure as though it fully appreciated the privilege. Teasingly, she threw her designer jacket over her shoulders and gave him a shy, rehearsed smile. The man eagerly rested his hand on her hip and his beer-soaked breath spoke intimately of how he hoped the rest of the night would be spent.
* * *
“I'm so wet for you right now,” Alice whispered to the man in the backseat of the car.
I swear if this Neanderthal tries to touch me one more time . . .
“Oh baby.” The man smiled broadly with anticipation, his rosy cheeks accented with exhilaration.
“Bring it on, baby,” he slurped between swigs of his beer. “Why wait until we get back to yours?”
The man was obviously drunk. Probably drunker than for his own good but in this situation, it played out perfectly. Almost too perfect.
“You and my husband can do anything you want to me . . . and I mean anything.”
Alice winked at Jonathan in the driver’s seat who returned with a weak smile. She had waited a long time for this moment.
“Your wife is one sexy slut . . . I mean . . . woman . . . shit. I hope I didn’t offend you, did I, buddy?” the drunk in the backseat stammered.
“This better be worth it,” he muttered at Alice, who mouthed at him to shut up. Jonathan’s knuckles turned white against the steering wheel. Still, he had his part to play in all this. Let the anger stir for just a little bit longer . . .
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